Play Along

Friday night, I made my way through the Taste Of Little Italy street festival to get to The Monarch Tavern. Though still busy, it didn't seem to have the same engagement as when it started. For one thing, the expanded patios were mostly empty.

Although it was officially an NXNE show, since it was a Dan Burke gig I expected the acts to not follow the schedule. Amazingly, they were no more than 10-15 minutes late. First act KNIFEY played a robust set of pop-punkish music. Thumbs up for the high energy but nothing I haven't heard before. I thought Rapport's music more engaging. Their updated take on dancey 80s pop were fun to bop to.

The next two acts had the best sets of the evening. Similar to her show last week at Dundas West Fest, Nyssa quickly commanded the room with her charismatic stage presence, big vocals, and dance-able but nihilistic songs. In fact, "headliner" Sir Babygirl gushed about Nyssa during her own set. I agreed that the latter was talented, but am more pessimistic about Nyssa's chance to "appear on billboards in a year" given today's music scene.

It was obvious the mostly queer crowd stayed for Sir Babygirl from New York. Kelsie Hogue pointed out she made "music for the gays". Her candid and breezy confessional banter between songs only endeared her to her fans. She admitted laughingly that when she made her debut album, she never expected that it would get much traction. So she packed it full of high-energy songs and ballads with big vocals. But now she has to sing them all live. And Sir Babygirl did struggle a bit with pitch, but not enough to detract from her set.